Process of manufacturing a bonded fiber pillow



p 22, 1970 B. E. LIEBERMANN 3,530,2@

PROCESS OF MANUFACTURING A BONDED FIBER PILLOW Filed Feb. 9, 1967 Edge Sealing Drying Conveyin 8 Spraying Web Wmding I NVENT OR Web Formin eflno E. Liebermmm United States Patent 3,530,020 PROCESS OF MANUFACTURING A BONDED FIBER PILLOW Benno E. Liebermann, Louisville, Ky., assignor to Novotex, Inc., Louisville, Ky., a corporation of Kentucky Filed Feb. 9, 1967, Ser. No. 614,984

Int. Cl. B3lc US. Cl. 156-189 8 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION This invention relates to the production of pillows, and more particularly to the production of bonded fiber pillow cores of unitary construction.

Heretofore, pillow cores manufactured from synthetic fibers have been merchandised in an essentially permanently closed ticking or casing. A prospective buyer was unable to inspect the fiber in core form due to the fact that the fibers utilized for this purpose were loosely garnetted fiber batts which could not be handled for inspection. The batt was formed into its final shape by the manufacturer and immediately encased in a specifically designed ticking which was sewn closed in order to prevent deformation of the fiber batt and fiber migration through any remaining openings in the ticking. Therefore, a zipper or button opening was not utilized for customer inspection of the fiber contents, and the customer could not verify the manufacturers advertised fiber content.

Prior art garnetted non-bonded fiber pillow cores also have the disadvantage that the user cannot wash the ticking or casing of a pillow of this design when required since the pillow would be deformed in the washing cycle and would not retain its original shape. The loosely felted fibers would migrate within the batt causing the formation of lumps, and the original loft of the pillow could not be reestablished.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention obviates the aforementioned disadvantages of the prior art by providing a bonded fiber pillow core of unitary construction. Since the fibers are bonded together, the core may be enclosed by a pillow ticking or casing which is provided with a zipper or other reuseable closure so that a customer may inspect the core within the pillow. Because the fiber core is three dimensionally bonded, there will be no migration of loose fibers through the ticking or casing which has been a nuisance in the past and has in some instances caused skin irritations, and maintain permanent loft and resiliency.

The pillow core of the invention may be removed from its ticking so that the ticking may be separately washed by conventional methods. If the bonded core is to be washed, it may be dry cleaned without materially influencing its original high loft and resiliency.

The fiber core of the invention may be produced by wrapping a previously bonded fiber batt in web form around a plate until the required weight and shape characteristics of a pillow core are achieved. A bonding agent is then sprayed onto the outer surface of the added Rando- Web fiber construction or batt which is wrapped around the prebonded fiber batt. The sprayed batt is passed through an oven to effect solidification of the bonding agent. The multilayered core is then stripped from the metal plate, and opposite edges of the projecting ends of the outer batt are trimmed and heat sealed to form the finished pillow core.

Fiber web is produced on garnetting equipment and crosslaid into a continuous web which is spray bonded throughout the thickness of the Web in a process called thorough bonding fiber bed process. The batt in this form is manufactured at a width of approximately and is slit into three widths pertaining to the final core size of a pillow to be manufactured. This bonded batt form is then cut into unit lengths in accordance with the final weights desired for arrival at specific densities of a pillow in accordance with predetermined specifications and Wound onto an aluminum heat-absorbing plate where a multilayered pillow core is prewound to form the desired configuration of a pillow. The core in this stage is transferred to a rando webbing machine where a thin layer of random web fibers is laid and formed around the prewound pillow core. Subsequently, the core in this form is transferred to a horizontally moving conveyor belt which passes through a spray booth and revolves the fiber core 360 during which rotation, said core is sprayed with a bonding agent serving the purpose of sealing the loosely Webbed fibers on the prebonded inner prewound layer. The sprayed pillow core in its surface wet form is continuously passed into an infrared drying and curing oven in a vertical hanging position whereupon after exposure to environmental temperatures of approximately 280350 the resin polymer is dried and cured. And, consequently, obtains its completely surface bonded characteristic. The web in this form is then stripped off the aluminum plate which served the purpose of reflecting the absorbed heat throughout the core of the pillow and fed into di-electric sealing machine which permanently seals both open ends of the pillow resulting in the final formation of the finished pillow core.

The process of the present invention is commenced with a garnetted, thoroughly bonded, high loft synthetic fiber batt. This has been produced with crosslaid garnetting equipment, bonded throughout, dried and cured. Presently a 96 inch line is being used so that the product can be slit into three equal widths of 32" each. This 32" dimension can, of course, be altered upward or down- Ward depending on the desired length of the pillow.

A length of the bonded batt which will yield sufiicient weight to produce the desired weight of the pillow is then wound around an aluminum mandrel. At this point, the wound batt is placed onto the conveying surface of a Rando-Webber and a separate and distinct, thinner, Rando-Web batt is wound onto the mandrel. There is, thus, at this point, one winding of the garnetted high loft batt surrounded by a second winding of Rando-Web, unbonded batt which is being produced on the machine in a sufficient width so that it extends for several inches on both sides of the batt. The entire produce is then sprayed with the resin and sent through a curing. The dual nature of the construction is important; that is, the inner core of high loft garnetted material and the outer Wrapper of widerbut thinner Rando-Web material. The former of these had already been bonded before the manufacture of the pillow process was commenced. The Rando-Web material on the other hand is bonded for the first time after it has been wound onto the madnrel as a wrapper around the basic batt core.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 illustrates diagrammatically steps entailed in manufacturing a bonded fiber pillow core in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view illustrating a fiber web being wound onto a plate or mandrel.

FIG. 3 is an elevational view showing the spraying station where the bonding agent is applied to the wound fiber web.

FIG. 4 is an elevational view showing the impregnated fiber web being conveyed through a drying zone.

FIG. 5 is an elevational view illustrating heat sealing of the opposite edges of the core.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view of a pillow core in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view showing the pillow core of FIG. 6 partially inserted into a pillow casing.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Referring now to the drawings and more particularly to FIG. 1, in the first step a prebonded high loft fiber batt 10 is wound around a shaping plate or mandrel 12 which may be, for example, an aluminum plate to form an inner layer. Then a nonbonded fiber web is formed in a conventional manner. For example, a suitable synthetic fibrous material such as a polyester, a polyamide (nylon), an acrylic or rayon is passed through a spike picking machine, and the fibers are fed into a feed hopper which distributes the fibers enenly and feeds the fibers into a batting machine such as a standard Rando-Webber.

The resulting fiber web, designated by reference numeral 11 in FIG. 2, which is wider than the fiber batt 10, is conveyed to a web winding station where the web 11 is *wound around the fiber batt 10 to form an outer layer which is normally thinner than the inner layer. The resulting core is designated generally by reference numeral 13. Preferably, plate 12 is revolving at a rate correlated to the speed of the travelling fiber Web 11.

After the requisite number of plies of the fiber web 11 (usually only one) have been built up upon the fiber 'batt 10 to obtain the desired weight and shape characteristics of the final product; the core 13 is placed upon a conveyor 14 by means of a hook 16 which passes through an aperture 18 in one end of the plate 12. A motor 20 or comparable mechanism is provided to rotate hook 16 in order to rotate the core 13 when it is at the spraying station so that the entire periphery of the core is impregnated to a desired depth by a spray of a bonding agent or adhesive from a spray gun 22. It will of course be appreciated that a plurality of spray guns or other suitable means could be provided to ensure uniform impregnation of the wound web.

Suitable bonding agents include nitrile rubbers, acrylics, polyvinyl chloride, polyvinyl alcohol, polyvinyl acetate, and copolyems and mixtures of the above with other compounds e.g. polyvinyl acetate with melamine. Particularly suitable commercially available bonding agents are Rohm & Haas Roplex I-IA 16 or HA 12 resins, Goodrich Geon 575 and 580. The depth of impregnation is usually about A" to 1 inch, preferably about one half inch when the core is to be used in an average sized pillow. The amount of bonding agent employed may vary between about 10 to weight percent, based on the weight of the fiber webs, preferably about 15 weight percent.

Following completion of the spraying operation, conveyor 14 transports the impregnated core through a drying station which may comprise an oven in which the adhesive is cured or set at about 280-350 F. for about 5-7 minutes. It will be understood that the foregoing are approximate conditions and may vary depending upon such factors as the particular bonding agent employed, the amount of bonding agent utilized, the size of the core, and the depth of impregnation. The solidification of the bonding agent results in a completely bonded outer surface being achieved on the core structure at the outer surface, and also fixes the shape of the fiber core for ease in handling.

The bonded core is transported to a sealer such as that illustrated in FIG. 5 in which the excess fibers are neatly trimmed while at the same time the core is heat sealed at opposite edges 24 by Teflon coated heating elements 26. As shown in FIG. 5, the two lower heating elements 26 are positioned upon a supporting surface 28, and the two upper heating elements are pressed downwardly onto the edges of the outer layer which extend beyond the inner layer by a hydraulic piston 30 and a plate 32. It will be understood that other suitable means may be employed to heat seal the edges of the core.

After the heat sealing operation is completed, the core is ready for use and has a configuration as illustrated in FIG. 6. The heat sealed edges 24 of the core are rather flexible and do not interfere with the desired softness characteristics of the pillow core.

The finished fiber core may be inserted into a pillow ticking or casing 34 through an opening having a reuseable closure means such as a zipper 36. Alternatively, the bonded fiber core may be sold without a ticking or casing thereby enabling the purchaser to utilize tickings pres ently in their possession or to purchase decorative pillow tickings or casing into which the bonded core can be inserted.

While presently preferred embodiments have been shown and described, it will be appreciated that the present invention is susceptible to various changes and modifications which will suggest themselves to those skilled in the art. It is intended to encompass all such changes and modifications as fall within the scope of the claims.

What is claimed is:

1. A process for producing a bonded fibrous article, comprising the steps of wrapping a multilayered fiber structure upon a mandrel, spraying a bonding agent onto the outer surface of said fiber structure, solidifying the bonding agent sprayed onto the fiber structure to form a unitary fiber structure, removing the unitary fiber structure from said mandrel, sealing a pair of opposite edges of the unitary fiber structure to each other, and insertingthe unitary fiber structure into a pillow ticking having a reuseable closure.

2. A process according to claim 1, wherein the amount of bonding agent sprayed onto the fibers is about 10 to 25 based on the weight of the fibers.

3. A process according to claim 1, wherein the bonding agent is solidified by subjecting the spray impregnated fiber structure to a temperature of about 280350 F. for about 5-7 minutes.

4. A process according to claim 1, wherein the fibers are selected from the group consisting of polyester, polyamide, acrylic and rayon fibers.

5. A process according to claim 4, wherein the bonding agent is selected from the group consisting of nitrile rubbers, acrylics, polyvinyl chloride, polyvinyl alcohol, polyvinyl acetate, and mixtures and copolymers thereof.

6. A process according to claim 1, wherein said fiber structure is formed by wrapping an inner layer of a bonded high loft fiber around said mandrel, and covering said inner layer with an outer layer of an unbonded fiber web, and wherein said bonding agent is sprayed onto the outer surface of said fiber web.

7. A process for producing a bonded fibrous article, comprising the steps of wrapping an inner layer of a bonded high loft fiber upon a mandrel, covering said inner layer with an outer layer of an unbonded web of a fiber selected from the group consisting of polyester, polyamide, acrylic and rayon fibers, placing said mandrel containing said inner and outer layers upon a conveyor, thereafter spraying a bonding agent onto the outer surface of said fiber structure, heating said bonding agent to bond the layers into a unitary fiber structure, removing the unitary fiber structure from said mandrel, and heat sealing a pair of opposite edges of the unitary fiber structure to each other.

8. A process according to claim 7, wherein the fiber 2,447,241 8/1948 Englund 156-190 of said inner layer is selected from the group consisting 2,525,644 10/1950 Brunson 156184 of polyester, polyarnide, acrylic and rayon fibers. 2,789,075 4/1957 Stahl 156-191 References Cited 5 CARL D. QUARFORTH, Primary Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS G. G. SOLYST, Assistant Examiner 2,016,273 10/1935 Atwood 156-190 2,265,075 12/1941 Knuetter 156306 US. Cl. X.R.

2,393,347 1/1946 Stuart 156306 5337; 156191 

